A Vow Without Honor

The Return

Arya

For days and nights, she had followed them, the men with the strange banners. The first night, she had picked off one of their guards. His bones crushed easily in her teeth. Men were weak creatures beneath their strange metal clothes.

The second night, she had driven their horses away, and feasted on the flesh of one of them. That was what brought the others. Small things, pale imitations of her brothers and sisters. Their alpha caved quickly to her, and so they followed, through the night and day, across fields and rivers, farther than any of them had been, against every instinct in their bodies. They picked the men off, first one by one, then more, until so few remained.

Tonight they would all die.

Tonight their alpha would writhe in her jaws.

She left the pack behind. They too had been wounded and needed to recover. This was for her alone; this was her kill.

Through the undergrowth of the forest she crept, as small as she could make herself. Strange scents surrounded her, different than days past. It put her on edge.

New packs? More men with the strange metal and biting sticks. It made no difference. She would not wait longer. They drew closer and closer to home. If he returned to his home of stone, there would be no vengeance, and that was all that mattered now.

She continued on her journey to their camp, smaller than it had been before, but there were no voices, no fire burned. There was only the scent of blood and death. She walked gently amongst the bodies, and made certain each had passed on, before continuing.

The alpha was not there.

In the distance, there was light. The wind shifted, bringing the new scents with it. Whatever had come was what had killed the men. She heard their voices, deep things, worn things.

Through the trees, she continued closer to the light. Old parts of her said to run, return to the pack, to safety, but she pushed against them. The alpha was close...so close.

Humans were gathered in a circle, staring at something above, hanging limply from a branch.

A body.

The alpha was dead.

Her kill had been taken.

She growled in anger.

The humans turned. A name flashed in her mind, a name from a different place.

Jory.

The man shouted and stopped the others from attacking. But one walked forward. It was different than the others. It stank of death and foul things, things that were not right, that did not belong there. It had wounds that kill creatures of its like, yet it walked with the living. It was wrong.

But the eyes...the eyes...

Mother...

Arya bolted upright in her bedroll, panting heavily and sweating despite the cold night air. Gendry looked over at her from the fire, having taken watch. The Hound snored somewhere in the distance.

"She's alive," Arya breathed. "My mother is alive."

"Your mother is dead, girl," the Hound grunted for the fourth or fifth time that morning.

"No, she isn't!" Arya shouted, stalking after him. They had traded the forests by the river for rolling hills some days ago, and spent hours at a time trekking across wide fields of grass. Game was harder to come by, and they were all a little hungrier and angrier for it.